Theodore Decker: Violence needn't be new normal in our city

Sunday

Historically, entire months have passed with fewer homicides. It seems as if a terrible momentum thrusts the city toward a record that stood unchallenged for 26 years.

That record is 139 homicides, set during the height of the crack cocaine epidemic in 1991. As of late Saturday, Columbus had logged 133 homicides for 2017, six shy of that landmark number with two weeks left in the year.

"The devil got its arms around the city," tweeted a young man — a boy, by the looks of him — in referencing last week's bloodshed. It was an interesting observation, given his account included video of himself flashing stacks of cash and a handgun.

But this killing culture isn't irreversible. There are ways to reduce the carnage, to reverse the collective mindset that violence is commonplace and unavoidable. The evidence continues to accrue.

A study published online and appearing in the January issue of the journal Epidemiology is among the latest, and the first to compare the potential impact of two leading models for reducing violence: targeted policing of so-called "hot spots," and a community-based strategy known as Cure Violence.

Magdalena Cerda, an associate professor at the University of California at Davis and the associate director of its violence-prevention research program, told me on Friday that the team of researchers from three universities based its findings on an extended computer simulation built upon layer after layer of real data. Using a complex blend of New York City census information, real-world police staffing numbers, crime statistics and data from a Cure Violence program in Brooklyn, the researchers filled virtual neighborhoods with multidimensional residents called "agents."

"We set up a virtual city," Cerda said.

"We allow years to go by, and we allow agents to interact with each other," she said. "We use all of those characteristics — where you live, who you are, who your friends are, where you are — to figure out what is the probability of violence occurring, given all of those risk factors."

Once confident their city behaved as a real one would, they introduced still more data to predict what would happen if the anti-violence strategies were undertaken.

Cure Violence was developed by Dr. Gary Slutkin, a Chicago infectious-disease physician who theorized that violence spreads through populations much like a disease. It therefore could be "interrupted" by well-trained intervention teams. The teams forge bonds with the most dangerous players on the streets and literally step in when violence is imminent. Over the longer term, these interruptions accrue, reinforcing that violence was no longer "necessary" or tolerated.

Cerda said the simulation predicted that violence dropped 13 percent over 10 years when Cure Violence was introduced. Targeted policing strategies led to an 11 percent drop in violence, but only when the size of the virtual police force was doubled.

"You need to invest a lot more in policing to get the same effect that you would get with Cure Violence," she said.

When targeted policing, coupled with a 40 percent increase in the police force, was introduced alongside Cure Violence, the virtual city saw a 19 percent drop in violence over 10 years.

In a year like this, that might have meant 26 lives.

The study had its limitations, in part because researchers had to use simplified versions of the two approaches. Researchers could not, for example, account for the longer-term impact that Cure Violence might have on shifting societal norms.

"It's likely an underestimate of the impact of both of them," Cerda said.

I've noted before that Columbus squandered a chance seven years ago to implement a pilot of the Cure Violence program. That is water under the bridge, even if this river runs red.

Cerda's study is the type of research that Columbus, starting with Mayor Andrew J. Ginther and all of City Council, should be devouring, even if they must swallow their pride to do it.

With appetites whet, they might then pick up years of research suggesting that Cure Violence shows promise and that smart, hot-spot policing indeed can be effective. Assisted by criminologists, places such as Boston have hit upon effective "tough love" approaches of their own. Cerda said there are success stories to build upon in cities in the United States and abroad.

Their methods might differ, but one fact doesn't, she said.

"It has to be a sustained investment," Cerda said. "It's really a combination of interventions at multiple levels."

It takes no less to break free of the devil's embrace.

tdecker@dispatch.com

@Theodore_Decker

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